elegy

i sat down several times to write an elegy...for the passing of my dear friend, june...but the words won't come...maybe it's impossible to write mournfully of someone so electric...so honest...so dear...our first meeting well over a decade ago...tennis lessons at a public tennis court in huntington...maybe laughing more than hitting...a fast friendship...then moving our tennis talents (apparent mostly to us) to inside courts and lessons...discovering that with her forehand and my backhand we made one great tennis threat...thursday happy hours...saturday morning breakfast marathons at panera...dinners in town, sometimes with mike and jim...sometimes with other friends...always her magnetic smile...she knew me at my best...my worst...and all in between...watching our kids grow into wonderful young adults...in my life there have been less than a handful of people who have for no reason, shortened my name and called me "sher" (really, almost sounding like "sheh")...first, my brother...given what else he could have called me, it was a term of endearment...then a boss many years later...which first startled me, and then i hardly noticed...and then, june...when she said it i couldn't help but smile...to this moment i can't tell you which of us was "thelma" or "louise"..."lucy" or "ethel"...but i can tell you one was never really whole without the other...i only know that next time a bartender asks, "what'll it be"...it'll be june whispering to the bartender, "hey, this is my friend, sher"..and i"ll smile...

red, white...and blue....

it is fall...and a presidential election year...a political fall...pun intended...they debate...we debate on winners and losers...generally, we are the losers...change is slow, and impatience quick...because this is the most important race...since the last one...and others before...gas prices rise...interest rates are in the toilet...need i go on?...this blog is not a pro or con...it is not red state or blue state...although thinking about it gets me blue...i often look at the process bottom up, not top down...i try to pay attention to who is elected locally, then state...so much of my quality of life, or lack there of, depends on this...many are well-intentioned...and get swallowed up...some toil quietly, unrecognized for their efforts...so, when the results are in this november...and half of you want to run for the border...maybe run instead to a school board meeting... or town hall meeting...speak up, and speak up loudly...it is your right and responsibility...i hope to feel this way again...i hope to feel less mute in the political cesspool...i hope when i speak...someone listens...then maybe i will feel less red, white...and...blue

she stoops to conquer

and so now it is almost two weeks since we moved into our new condo...it is called an apartment suite...and it is spacious enough for the four of us...i do count donut, our cat, in the total, since if you know cats, he has established spreading and shedding rights in every room, nook and corner...but...we lived in a large center-hall colonial with a large unfinished basement ripe for throwing stuff...all the stuff you think you need...and so packing for storage when we had to, rather quickly, move to our rental was painful...we had months while the house was on the market to prep...and some of us did (me)...you get the picture...during the last panic days in the house...when closing was moved up a week just to definitively test the value of my blood pressure meds...we started that act of random throwing into boxes...generically labeling them...so when the storage company came, and we looked at such boxes, we had no idea what the fuck was in them...and so now as we unpack and try to put it all away...excuse me... i need to scream a loud silent scream and curse at the boxes...we are getting there...it also became fall somewhere in this mess and i suppose we will suddenly wake up one morning soon looking for jackets, socks and shoes...for my jewish followers, did you really expect anything less than the humid disgusting weather that was yom kippur?...i love fall but i get that sick feeling underneath it for what comes next...winter...i do take some solace that moving has removed the sheer terror that was my driveway during icy snowstorms when i could have invited olympic hopefuls to try their luge runs on that driveway...i try the optimistic approach...a new season..hoping it loosens the writers' block that's held me all summer (poetry)...so when leaves fall at my feet in a few weeks i can bend, let one slip through my fingers, smiling a box-free smile....

what's so funny 'bout peace love and understanding

hey, if you're gonna steal a song title, steal from the best? right...so here we are...september...squeezing the last days of summer and frowning at fading tan lines...and I am in moving hell...again...the last phase of our saga...from the rental on one side of the condo complex...to our new apartment on the other...sounds easy, right?...i keep muttering to myself...where did all this shit come from???...after all the donations, tossing, selling and packing in april...i thought i was ahead of the game...my daily list of appointments and calls makes me nauseous...the fact that i am not writing has me concerned...but there is a bright spot...i am too busy or exhausted to really see all the news...which is a very good thing...because the news leaves an empty spot somewhere inside...and i imagine it is the same for anyone reading this...it angers and saddens me that hatred hides behind claims of piety...the world is burning on the heels of the anniversary of 9/11...in advance of the holiest of days for jews around the globe...and i suspect far from coincidental...sometimes i feel 9/11 and the aftermath left me numb and unable to really feel fear...every bombing, assassination, heinous act...leaves a feeling of hollow resignation...i am the hostage...my mouth taped so i cannot scream...limbs tied so i cannot run...and so i turn the tv off...head to another box...and dive...way back to the past...wishing all who celebrate a very peaceful rosh hashanah...and even those who don't...may you and yours be wrapped in peace and love...

see you in september

ah, september...a month that evokes such strong memories...the earliest, of course, school days...the excitement of new clothes, which you insist on wearing even if it is 90 degrees...a lunchbox with your favorite tv character smiling from both sides...mix the aroma of new crayola with the pungent smell of freshly sharpened pencils and vinyl and you are back walking into the new classroom that first day again...flash forward to college...when august ushers the new and september finds you buried under the weight of heavy reading and term papers...maybe typed on an old smith corona with white-out at your side...on top of that old webster's....and then a few years later...september, just another month in a work year, maybe marked by your fading tan line and one last outdoor happy hour...then the married september...the jewish edition..."where are we breaking fast?" "what should i bring?" "is it too warm for a wool suit??"...blink, and you are shopping for your children...calming nervous tummies and fainting at the register total, class supply list in hand...and now september....when in a few weeks i will hopefully move from our rental into our new condo...my "to do" list longer than santa's...the thought of the 50+ boxes in storage making me want to run...run backwards..."i dream of jeannie" lunchbox in hand...skipping the streets of canarsie...first day...new beginnings...

rachel getting married

last night after watching the olympics closing ceremony...and btw...couldn't katy perry make one of the conditions of her divorce be that russell brand can never open his mouth again?...i flipped through the evening news...all newscasts had the same news...never good...with the same teaser and highlight...my head perked up...maybe the upcoming finale of the ceremony would have the stones and zeppelin...you know...those lesser british musical icons...but no...lo, and behold...jennifer aniston is getting married...again...and in case we've been brain dead for the better part of the last decade...she's beating her ex...you know, that guy...oh, yeah...brad pitt...to the alter...or so she thinks...because we all know when that ground-breaking news broke angelina was kicking his ass out of bed and speed-dialing rent-a-minister...somewhere aniston's agent is kvelling...realizing that this news makes us get misty-eyed and we'll forget that her post-"friends" career, although not a box-office nightmare, has...for the most part...except for a small gem, "the good girl"...been a critical nightmare...but for now, she can focus on the wedding...maybe leave the one-star reviews to kate hudson...but jennifer should watch out for the thud at the front door...that would be angelina tossing the kids out of the car as she bolts for the wedding chapel with brad...

lead us not into penn station....

it is lunchtime on a wednesday....i am in penn station and it is a leper colony....i suppose you could break it down like this...grand central has that architecture, nice restaurants and well-suited commuters...port authority has cleverly pushed the masses upwards on platforms away from the naked eye...but penn, and particularly the lirr side...it's all out there...and noontime, summertime...a double-treat...the tourists, wandering around aimlessly toting 1000 lbs of ugly luggage, swaying side to side, maximizing full tripping potential...the stroller brigade with toddlers lagging behind..in flip flops...walk behind them on the stairs and there is one hour you will never get back in your lifetime...but i have figured out a way to lose weight!...just inhale the aroma wafting from the far corners...what is that?...dior, chanel...no, it is a '70's staple of the city...eau de piss #5...i made this trip yesterday for two reasons...very different...the first, a follow-up with the neurosurgeon who removed a benign tumor from my skull 7 years ago leaving me a little shaken and resembling something like hellraiser with my "55-staples" hairline...this time he smiled and said we were done...no more follow-ups...i was within two blocks of the time warner center and some pretty nice watering holes where i could have toasted this news...i opted for the little coffee shop around the corner where i had stopped so many times over the years before and after appointments...it seemed more fitting...and started this blog...several hours, and rain showers later...it was the beacon theater for a night with the "dukes of september"...that is michael mcdonald, donald fagan and boz scaggs....from the balcony...when they came on stage it looked something like jerry garcia's straight-haired brother, martin scorsese, and neil diamond...but while donald and michael strained a bit, there was boz...senior of the three...blowing away the audience....especially with "lowdown"...and there we were in the '70's...in the city...gritty, but never sweeter